Glittering future for… librarians

In Blogspotting Senior Writer Stephen Baker and Associate Editor Heather Green take a look at how cutting-edge technologies are changing business and society. Whether its blogs or wikis, data crunching or data targeting, technology’s advances are reshaping the world that we live in.

If one profession appeared endangered by the digital age, it was the librarian. But only at first glance. In the age we’re entering, as Steve Rubel notes, the challenge will not be finding limited information in finite realms, but instead in unearthing relevant info in near limitless mountains of data. Google, of course, does this with algorithms.

But humans—call them librarians, or curators—will have plenty of work too. They’ll not only help find info, but also oversee the machines overseeing the flow, security and complex layers of access to certain data.